Imagine arriving at work to discover that the office is closed; imagine being told to have a coffee somewhere while someone tries to organise finding a key to get the office opened; imagine no one knowing where or how to find the key. Imagine 4 hours later gaining entrance to the office, only to discover the Server is down and you have no internet access.  If you can imagine all this, welcome to down-town Durban. For a Westerner accustomed to meetings and deadlines, it’s both frustrating and culture-shocking.   Things do happen here – but much more slowly than in the UK, and in ways that we would find frustrating.  10 steps are needed to make something happen instead of two! Perhaps it’s one outward sign of a young, integrated leadership and management. I can only hope that this comment is not an arrogant reflection.   It is sincerely not meant as such.  Apartheid ended in South Africa in 1994.  Even so, many young black, coloured, and “Other Coloured” graduates left Durban for Cape Town and Johannesburg in search of work.  Few have returned.  Back empowerment is still a struggle here and the city is a visual mix of classy tourist enterprises and economic struggle. Durban struggles with integration among its population: Indian, Zulu, Qua-Zulu, Xhosa, Afrikaans, white South Africans and supporters of either ANC or IFM political parties. In Church on Sunday, the white community struggled to have tea and cake with the young people gathered for a youth service from across the different communities (mostly black, coloured, Indian and from the opposing political parties.)   Most went home immediately following the service. Housing too here is segregated:  Older white homes still bear clear marks of the Apartheid era:  small 1 roomed outlets at the rear of mansions where black maids lived (and in some cases still do.  In other cases these 1 roomed outlets are taken  up by people from outside South Africa, contributing to the increasing problem of Xenophobia.)  Newer built homes in these very nice suburban areas are taken up by the few accepted up and coming affluent Blacks.  In the townships (like council housing estates), Black, Indian and Coloured people live.  No white people live here.   Xenophobia is a real issue here:  local people blame and hate foreigners who have entered South Africa in search of work – and who are managing to find basic work (which, I am told, South Africans don’t want to do in any case.)  Crime towards  these foreigners is high.   Tomorrow I visit a number of townships…..